PDJ (Petit-dejeuner, a.k.a. breakfast: 8am to 12pm).
The breakfast shift has the potential to be absolute hell if everyone decides to show up at the same time. The space is small, the people sans caffeine can be rude and demanding, and they often leave behind a mountain of crumbs, smears of Nutella and honey, and plates half full of non-eaten food that ends up being wasted and pissing me off. Thankfully, there was no mad rush today and people came in at a decent pace, giving Christiane and I just enough time to keep everything under control (Christiane, who I haven't yet mentioned, mainly works the breakfasts and does some catered events. She is wonderful. So wonderful. She works her ass off and never fails to flash give you the warmest smile. When she asks, 'Ca va?' she actually wantsto know how you're doing instead of saying it just to fill the empty space. And best of all, she wears the same perfume as Omi, so my olfactory cells work in her favor as well.) And because Amandine--who was supposed to show up at 8 am--called in sick, we had some extra work to do but we handled it without any issues or overspent energy.
Dejeuner (translation... you guessed it: lunch), la terrace.
Remember how I said that a day can go from being average to totally shitty? Allow me to set the scene... My left hand balances a tray with two full bottles of water (these bottles being glass and inconveniently tall, skinny, and awkward) and my right hand pours water with a third bottle into the guests' glasses. Of course, the manager puts the table of six in a spot where expert maneuvering between umbrellas, chairs, and plants is required. Five glasses down and only one more to go, I move to the last guy. Unfortunately, when I attempt to squeeze between the two chairs to reach his glass, my balancing skills falter dramatically. It all happened in slow motion, frame by frame... The tumbling bottles falling onto the man (one empty, one full)... The sparkling water spilling out in waterfall fashion... Their gaping gazes turning in my direction as though someone was choreographing their uniformed reactions... And me, desperately scrambling to fix this situation as quickly as possible while maintaining even the smallest amount of dignity and composure. "Je suis tres, tres desole, Monsieur. Mais, ce n'est pas le vin rouge!" Oh god, if it would have been red wine I think I would have died right there. Or jumped off the terrace. Thankfully, the man wasn't too angry and we were sort of able to laugh it off.
After my moment of clumsy glory, I was terrified to take anything to their table. My hands were all shaky and I didn't want to know what else I was capable of. Not today. I successfully avoided them for the rest of lunch, that is, until I was told to bring them espressos. Dammit dammit dammit. The same tray, now covered with espressos and coffees, balanced on my left hand. Be steady. DO NOT SPILL. Confidence, baby, confidence. And then, like a negative manifestation or something, I spilled espresso. With the same guy, though this time I didn't actually spill it directly on him. (Or I pretended not to and he didn't notice.) The worst part is that there was nothing special about the man. I wish I could say that he was so beautiful and so charming that I was distracted by the perfect romantic comedy happy-ending playing on repeat in my mind with thousands of tea lights and Boyz II Men's "I'll Make Love to You" playing in the background. Nope, not even that exciting. I just couldn't keep it together and every clumsy moment I'd luckily avoided thus far seemed to be playing out in one very long afternoon. Awesome. Well, at least I didn't drop any plates in the middle of the restaurant. No, no. I'll save that for another time.
There are plenty of other embarrassing details about the lunch shift that I'll refrain from sharing, but let me just say, it was not my finest working hour(s). Being short-staffed and absolutely slammed thanks to one of the last days of summer sunshine meant that I had to work an extra two hours. Cool, great, excellent. Once we finished cleaning up and taking everything down from lunch, I retreated to my room where I slept and recovered and prepared for the third and final shift of the day.
Diner.
The restaurant was completely booked. Inghams on the middle floor and a catered event on the upper level. I don't know where the energy came from but it came and just in time because pretty much everyone decided to come within the same 30 minute period. And being such a big Inghams night, I was doing all the running around while my manager did nothing. N-o-t-h-i-n-g. Ass. I was at least happy to be serving kind people with few special requests or complaints. And in English. Thank GOD in English. I summoned my chattiest self and thoroughly enjoyed talking to the different tables of English folk, of course A & D being my favorites. It being their last night in the hotel (yes, tear), we swapped digits and emails and promised to stay in touch as I mentioned before.
Finally there was my last table for the evening: an American couple from Pebble Beach who I liked immediately, slightly biased perhaps. We bonded over California, living abroad (they had lived in Paris for a few years), and a general thing I like to call "Americanness" that made us just get each other. And five minutes before they left, D (the wife) called me over to their table to give me her card, personal email address, and phone number. "Just in case you ever need anything, sweetheart, you are welcome to stay with us anytime!" I was shocked. Two invitations in one night and all I did was chat with people. I told you this job rocks! (Or it's nights like these that keep me motivated.) They gave me the three Swiss kisses (left cheek, right cheek, left cheek) and said goodbye, or until the next time. Hey, you can never have too many connections!
And there the one day saga ended, though it took me a while to get to sleep because I was so wired from a day of so much activity. From clumsiness and embarrassment to content clients and new friends. A little bit of everything I suppose. I would just like to skip the whole make-myself-look-like-a-total-idiot part. But I have to admit, being put in those uncomfortable situations when you can either choose to let the embarrassment ruin you or merely shrug it off forces me to laugh a little extra, even if it's at my own expense. And the way I look at it, at least I'm laughing, right?
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